およそ去年のこの頃、一ヶ月間の入院の最後、退院しようとしていた。この投稿がその入院になった理由の話です。
(I would have written this down earlier, but I've been busy, and it's been a little painful to write. [Updated Jan. 5 -- It really is hard for me to write this stuff down.][Japanese translation began Jan. 5.])
（忙しくて、文書に移すのがやや苦労のもので、もっと早く書き留めようと思ったんだけどできていない。[ちゃんと書いておくのがホンマに辛いのでまた１月５日追加。][和訳は同じ５日に開始。]）
A year ago, towards the end of October, on a night when I had planned on going to the ping-pong night at church, I was instead at home working on a distributor box for the receiver in a wireless mike system we use when someone translates at church meetings. Several of the solder joints were cold and needed re-flowing.
一昨年の１０月の終わりぐらい、教会の卓球ナイトに行こうと思っていた夜に、その替りに、家で教会の集会を通訳するときに使っている無線マイクの受信機の配信箱の手入れ作業にとりかかっていた。ハンダ接続不全の数カ所を溶かして流し直す必要があったのです。
The job search that week had not gone well, and neither had my writing. I was late and frustrated.
その一週間の就活も、文筆の（つもりの）作業も巧く行かず、卓球ナイトの遅れにも挫折感を味わっていた。
Finishing the repair work, I threw the box in my bag, threw on a hoodie and another jacket, put my shoes on in the genkan, and headed out the door in a minor heat.
修理を完成したらカバンに配信箱をほり込んで、フーディともう一枚のジャケットを纏って玄関で靴を履いて、小型の熱の勢いで玄関を出た。
We got rid of our car after moving back to the city because we really don't need one. It's often easier to get where you need on a bicycle.
都会に戻った時、車がもう要らないと思って廃車処分にしておいた。大概は自転車だけで充分行きたいところへ動き回れる。
I dumped my bag in the basket and headed out of the bike parking area. I turned right out of the car parking lot into the chill of the early autumn night, but it isn't really all that dark around here. The roads are fairly well lit most of the way to church.
自転車のカゴにカバンを漬け込んで駐輪所を離れて駐車場からは右へ、冷たくなりかけている秋の夕方に向かい出た。ただ、この近辺はそれほど暗くはない。教会に向かう道は殆ど街灯がよく設置され、夜でもまあまあ明るいのです。
I generally used to have a habit of accelerating hard on the bike. I just don't like wasting time. I think you can understand why I haven't been able to do that much accelerating hard lately, and maybe I don't want to any more.
以前は、自転車に乗って加速するとき、力入れて急加速をする癖があった。時間の無駄が嫌ですから。ご理解していただけると思うが、現在はそんなに加速したりは難しいし、しようと思うこともないかもしれない。
I turned left at the intersection at the northwest corner of the elementary school campus. (There was a kindergarten there last year that the city has regrettably since torn down.) I think I remember a small van arriving at the intersection at about the same time. Anyway, I stayed on the sidewalk on the left side of that street, to let any traffic pass unimpeded, building speed. Apartments, and then houses, abut hard against the sidewalk to the north (my left as I went), and there are school grounds with trees hanging over the sidewalk on the south, across the street.
小学校内グラウンド北西の交差点にて左へ。（去年、その角はまだ幼稚園があって、あいにく閉鎖になって潰されたのです。）ライトバン車がほとんど同時に交差点に入った記憶があるかのようにあるけど。とにかく、後ろから来る自動車などに絡まないように自転車を左側の歩道に走らせて加速した。道の北側のぼくの走る方向の左にはアパートから戸別住宅に替わっていって、それぞれ歩道に寄りかかるように建つ。道の向い側は学内グラウンドの木々の枝が南側の歩道を覆い被る。
As I approached the intersection at the northeast corner of the school grounds, near the pool, I eased back to check traffic under the street lamps. The stop sign is on the intersecting street there, but I didn't want to take chances.
グラウンドの北東角、プール付近の交差点に近づいていくと、街灯が照らした道の交通を確認するために速度をやや落とした。止まれの標識が渡る道にあっても、危険を冒すつもりじゃなかった。
When I was sure the intersection was clear, I accelerated again, and I was probably doing 30 Kilometers per hour (about 20 Mph) as I left the sidewalk into the intersection, probably over 40 Kph (25 Mph) when I entered the shoulder safety strip that replaced the sidewalk on the other side of the intersection.
交差点に車が入って来ないのがわかるとまた加速して、歩道から交差点に入るともう、３０キロ時速だっただろう。交差点を渡って歩道の代わりになっている路肩安全地帯に進んで、時速が４０キロになっていたに違いない。
I think I became aware of the car parked (quasi-illegally) in the safety strip in front of me as I crossed the intersection, but I'm human and react slow, so I didn't quit accelerating until after I had entered the safety strip.
正面のその安全地帯を防いでいた自動車に気が付いたのは多分交差点を渡っている間だったと思う。然しぼくは人間です。反応が遅いです。加速をやめるのは安全地帯に入ってからでした。
I started moving right, toward the center of the road, but I was fighting momentum, moving too fast to swerve hard. But there was plenty of time to avoid the car itself.
道の中心の右に寄ろうと、運動量の弾みがあって、その勢いとの遣り合い。急に向きを変えて避けるのが速度の勢いで無駄。でも、自動車そのものは問題なく、十分避けれるほどの余裕だった。
This is a fairly wide residential road for a Japanese city, but it is barely wide enough for two ordinary sized cars to pass, carefully. (Ordinary size cars in Japan are still compact in the US, if you are wondering.) On the north side (my left that night) of the street there is a rice paddy, and the south side has, in sequence heading east, a parking lot, an apartment complex, a couple of houses, and another apartment complex.
その道がまあまあ広い。日本の都会にしてはまあまあ。乗用車二台が通りかかるには、気を付けて行くなら通れる。（気になるなら、日本の乗用車って、米には軽型になる。）左（北側）には田圃、南側は駐車場の後アパートがあって、そのあとは家とまたのアパートがある。
Not a lot of room to dodge a door if it opens at the wrong time, but the road is well lit, and what are the odds?
車のドアが危うく開くなら、なんとか避けるほどだけど、ぎりぎりに近い。それに確率は少ないと思うやろう。
I was moving to the center of the road anyway. Just didn't have time to move all the way to the right, and there was always the worry about traffic behind me.
取りあえず道の中をと移動しよう。完全に右まで行くには間に合わないし、後ろの予期しぬ車も気になっていた。
Also, I was a little too close to brake hard. Even if the door had already been opening, braking hard there would not have allowed me to swerve, and I would have smashed myself and the bike into the door had I done so. But it wasn't opening. Not yet.
急ブレーキは近すぎる。ドアは既に開く途中だったとしても、急ブレーキすると避けるに必要な余裕がなく自分と自転車がドアに突っ込むことになっただろう。それに、開こうとするようには見えなかった。まだまだ見えなかった。
The police asked me later whether I was worried about possible vehicular traffic from behind. Of course I was. But trying, at between 40 and 30 Kph, to move out of the way of a door that could reach at least the middle of the street if it opens is not exactly easy.
警察さんは後で後ろから来る自動車などを気にしていたかを聞いてくれたんや。無論のこと。ただ、開くとしたら、４０から３０キロの間の時速、道の真ん中を超えていく開くドアを避けるのも簡単な制御ではない。
You might say bicycles shouldn't go that fast. A lot of people I know will raise their eyebrows in disagreement at such a suggestion.
自転車はそんな速度走るはずはないという人は確かに居る。私の知り合いの内、反対に意見に眉毛を上げる人が多いと思う。
Maybe I could've-should've braked anyway, but you don't get far down the street with your brakes engaged all the time. Anyway, there was no time, and I did try to move away from that car, for no reason other than a hunch.
申しかして
And the door opened just at the wrong time, just in time for the edge to catch my ring finger as I swerved past.
避けて通ろうと、一番あかん隙、ちょど指輪の指に引っかかるところドアが開いた。
Well, I did get past the door, but my handlebar was jerked left. And the door swung out a bit, so I had to work hard to avoid taking the edge of it between my legs.
まあ、通ったのは通ったけどハンドルがグイに左へ引っ張られた。それにドアがブランとまた開けて、的間に股に受けてしまわないように力を使わなあかん。
I put my feet down to try to balance the bike, but I was still doing at least 15 Kph, I think still over 25 (over 10 Mph, probably over 15).
自転車のバランスをとろうと足を地面に付けたが、まだまだ１５キロ以上、多分２５キロの時速だったはず。
My feet stuck on the pavement, then came unstuck, and then I was flying over the handlebars.
足がくっ付いた。そして外れて、ボクノ体が飛ばされてハンドルを超えた。
I thought I was dead.
マジで死ぬと思った。
But then I felt like I should just relax, and put myself in God's hands.
とこれで、楽にして神様の手に自分の身を任せるべきだという感があった。
Momentum or angels stretched me out flat by the time I hit the pavement, and my hood flew up to cover my face. Probably an angel had a hand in that, too.
運動量の弾みだったか。天使だったか。体が地面に着くまでは平らになっていた。上着のフードが浮かんでぼくの顔を守る位置になった。それも天使の技だったかも。
I didn't end up sliding very far. But I took most of the impact on one elbow.
それほど滑らなかったけど、衝撃の力がほとんど片方の肘に当たったらしい。
[JMR: Translation to here by 17 Jan.ここまでの翻訳は１月１７日までです。]
There's still some blank space there, but bits of my memory of this have come back a little at a time.
記憶にまだ隙が出るが、少しずつ戻ってきている分もある。
I think I was screaming while I was flying, but I still don't remember. When I came back to myself, I was face-down on the asphalt, with my hood between the asphalt and my face, screaming. Maybe I screamed for fifteen seconds or so, but it seemed like a foolishly long time. At that point, it was more frustration than pain.
宙に浮いている間はもしかして叫んでいたかもわからないけど今は覚えていない。我に戻れば、アスファルトにうつむきになりフードが顔とアスファルトの間に挟まっていて、叫んでいた。叫ぶのは多分15秒ぐらいだったが、恥ずかしくなるほど長い感じだった。最初は痛みよりも挫折感。
I know how to handle pain, and I had automatically began what I do to handle it. Pain is how the body tells you there is damage, and if you understand that it isn't nearly as frightening.
痛みはどうやって対処するかがわかるのだ。もう、対処の手順に入っていた。痛みだって、怪我になっていることを知らせてくれるものです。こういうことすら理解しておくと、痛みの怖い感覚がずっとましだ。
Screaming in the early moments of serious pain can be useful, but after that it mostly just makes the pain worse.
ひどく痛くなる瞬間に叫ぶのは効き目があるにして、叫び続けるとほとんど痛みを悪くするばかり。
I recovered my breath and quit screaming and started assessing the damage. The arm that had taken the impact was under me, and did not move without severe pain. But the other arm was free and not in too much pain to move.
息を抑えて、叫び辞めるとすぐに怪我の状態を探り始めた。地面の打撃を受けた方の腕は体の下に、ひどい痛みなしには動かなかった。あまり当たらなかった方は自由に、それほど痛みなしで動かすことが出来た。
There were sharp pains in my back, but I could feel my legs and move them. But there was significant pain in both legs and both feet, especially the right thigh and my hips.
背中にきつい痛みがあったが、両方の足は感覚がわかり、動かすことも可能。ただ、両脚両足は結構痛くて、右側の太腿も腰も特に痛みが感じた。
I was worried about my neck and spine, but I was also worried about being in the middle of the road, unable to see around me. So I braced the arm that was hurt worst and carefully rolled myself on my back.
首や背骨のことのはもちろん、道の真ん中に転んでいて、周りが見えないのも懸念すべきだと思っていた。もっと傷んだ方の腕を何とか留めて体を慎重に、仰向きに直した。
And I was happy to be alive.
それに、生きていて嬉しかった。
The driver who doored me came into my visual range, and I relatively calmly asked him to call an ambulance. I might have been grimacing or I might have been grinning ironically.
ドアで遣っ付けたその車の運転手が見えるところに寄って来たら、何とか精神を落ち着かして救急車の連絡を頼んだ。苦痛で顔をゆがめていたか。それとも皮肉を感じて反論に笑っていたか。
[A note here: Laughter is good medicine, but it can unnerve the people around you, and cause them to be suspicious. I don't think I actually laughed, but I was not really frowning most of the time, and I didn't scream or holler any more after the first scream.
注：笑うのがよく効く薬だけど、周りの人間を混乱させ、自分に対して疑問を抱かせることもある。僕は大笑いはしていなかったと思うのだが、ずっと顔をしかめていたわけでもなかったし、一番最初叫びだした以降は泣いたり叫んだりはしなかった。
Frowning makes you hurt worse. I hate that.
顔をしかめてイタイイタイ言うのは痛みをもっとひどく感じさせる原因となっていしまうのだ。更に痛くなるのはお断りです。
But smiling also makes the insurance agent think you're cheating.
しかし、ニコニコして笑うのは保険会社の方にインチキの疑問を持たすらしい。
End note.]
The daughter of one of the families who live near there is friends with my daughter, and she happened to be home. She ran and got my family, and the ambulance came, and the police came, and they were careful when they moved me, and I ended up in the hospital for a month.
さて。その辺に住んでいる家族の娘は、家の娘の友達なんで、偶然に家に居てた。私の家まで行って報せて、連れて帰って来てくれたのだ。また救急車や警察が来て、僕のことを救急車に乗せてもらって、結局一か月の入院が決まった。
Damage:
損傷：
Hairline fractures in the toes in one foot, from when I tried to balance and stop myself.
自分と自転車のバランスを取り戻して止めようとしたところの衝撃から、片方の足のつま先に罅が入った。
Severe strain in the inner thigh of the other leg, from the same stress of trying to balance the bike and stop myself, and from the impact with the ground. I didn't really recover from that strain until after I left the hospital.
同じく止めようとしたところと、地面に衝突した衝撃力から、反対側の脚内に挫折や内部打撲。その足は入院の間、直ることはなかった。
It was a week after the surgery before they let me start walking a little, and I had to use the leg in order to work the pain out. Stretching it out in the air while I was lying in bed helped with the pain, and helped loosen things up so I could start walking again. I think it was six months before I could walk without pain and start trying to run again.
手術の一週間後やっと、歩くのは許されるようになった。しかし、足を使わずにはその打撲と挫折を解しだすのができない。まあ、ベッドに寝ていて上や横に足を延ばしたりすれことで痛みも筋肉もある程度和らげることができ、また歩けるようになった。でも、痛みなしで歩けるのはその6か月後だった。走るのも退院6カ月目から試みることができた。
Sprained fingers in the hand that took the edge of the door, strains in both hands and arms from going over the handlebar. Strains all over, really. Other than the thigh strain, most of those, and the hairline fractures in the toes, healed well enough during the first two weeks in the hospital.
ドアの端を受けた手の指が挫折。ハンドルの上に飛ばされたところから、両手両腕に内部打撲。真面目に言えば体全体が内部打ち身。太腿の内部傷以外は、入院中の最初の２週間の間にある程度治まった。
But I did have to postpone a job interview until after I got out of the hospital. (I was ultimately turned down for that job. Something more than 40 other applicants, most of them half my age, higher and more ostensibly applicable degrees, not recovering from an accident. I have more experience, but at my age experience gets discounted a lot.
そして、就職面接の一か所を入院のために伸ばしてもらう必要があった。（その仕事は結局、断られた。自分以外は40人が申し出て、そのほとんどが僕の歳の半分で、僕の学位よりも上、且つもっと表向きに応用できる学位持ち、事故から回復しつつではない。僕の方は経験を豊富に持っているとしてもこの年齢では経験が割引評価されるのだ。
And I really was still not at my best for the interview, two weeks after getting out of the hospital. I really haven't been up to a proper interview since the accident. Been turned down for every full-time job I've interviewed for after the accident.)
退院後2週目のその面接には中々、最上の面接できる状況ではなかった。正気に話しするなら、事故以来、正確に面接できるほどではない。フルタイム仕事ならの面接は全滅。お断りらしい。）
When you know how to handle pain, they say you have a high tolerance for pain. This is a good thing, but you don't know what to say when people ask if you're in pain. Scale from one to ten? I had to remember that sensations I no longer consider more than informational are what other people beg for aspirine or novocaine (procaine) for.
痛みの対処がわかると、忍耐力、痛みに対して強いと言われるようだ。悪いことではないが、痛いかと聞かれるときはどう答えていいかが分からなくなる。一から十の痛さ？情報と現在思っている感覚だけと、大概の人ならその感覚でアスピリンやプロカイン（ノボカイン）を頼むことを思い出さない、と。
If you call it pain, yeah, it hurts. I don't like pain, so I call it information.
「痛い」と言ったら、まあ、痛いやけど。痛みは嫌いので、「情報だ」と僕が言う。
My wedding band ended up squashed into a heart shape, and they had to cut it off at the hospital. But my finger was not broken. I guess it was supported during the impact by the handlebar, and protected by the ring. That probably should be noted as a miracle, too.
結婚指輪が潰されて、ハートの形になってしまった。病院でその指輪を切り離すことになった。幸いに指そのものが折れていなかった。ドアと衝突の際、ハンドルに支えられ、指輪に守れたようだ。それも奇跡として認識した方が良いだろう。
Had to use the money the insurance gave us for the ring for food for the family.
指輪が潰されたことで保険会社からもらったお金を家族の食べ物に回すしかなかった。
[JMR: Translation to here, Jan. 29. ここまでの翻訳は1月29日。]
Two cleanly sheared ribs in my back and a greenstick fracture in another, all near my spine. Those breaks probably protected my spine when my feet stuck and sent me flying, and again when I hit the street. The doctors had me in a corset, and wouldn't allow me to walk until those had taken hold and were strong enough not to break loose again from the stress of standing up.
背中の肋骨2本綺麗に骨折、もう一本が不完全骨折、それぞれの折れた位置が背骨に近い。足が路面に引っかかったことによって飛ばされたときに折れ目ができ、路面に衝突した時に更に折れたと僕は思う。折れたことによて背骨が守れたでしょう。肋骨がまたくっ付いてある程度接着するまでは医師にコルセット着せられ、歩くのが禁止だった。立つストレスに更に折れないほど確実に治るまでは安静の命令だった。
The elbow that took the impact was shattered. The doc described it as pounded to gravel, but she may have been slightly exaggerating. Slightly. Call it large gravel.
衝突を受けた肘は綺麗に砕かれた。先生は「砂利」と、多分少し大げさに言った。小石の大きさと言っていい。
I should get the x-rays from the hospital and post them. Heh.
病院からレントゲンをもらって投稿してもいいかも。（小笑）
Scrapes here and there, but my clothes took most of the abrasion.
遠近の擦り傷はあったが、擦れたところはほとんど服に守れたらしい。
And that was pretty much the sum of the damage. Sort of.
損傷は凡そそれぐらいだったと思う。およそ。
Except for the novels I was working on at the time. All of that has gone into suspended animation by now. Trying to get a "real" job before my body is ready leaves me no time to work on them, and no energy when I do have some time.
事故が起こった時点に作文に勉めた小説をおいては。その小説は只今冬眠している。体が治れようとしていながら「本当」の仕事と言われる仕事に就くように努力しようと、時間も消えるし、時間が取れそうなのがあれば力も尽きている。
X-rays and MRI both showed no damage to spine or neck, which is a great blessing.
レントゲンも磁気共鳴映像法のMRIも首及び背中の骨には害が無いような判定です。祝福です。
Why didn't I take more damage to my neck and spine? Good question. I exercise pretty regularly, so I was in fairly good shape to start with -- but not like when I was a college student learning jiu-jutsu. If I had tried to tuck and roll, I could easily have gotten tangled in the bike and broken my neck. Even if I had cleared the bike, I would likely have come down wrong on my back and neck. The way I hit the ground was either pure luck or the hand of God, whichever you prefer to believe in.
首及び背骨がもっと痛まれなかった理由はどうですか？どうでしょう？基準的に体操する習慣が昔からあって、元々まあまあの良い方の健康だった。（但し、大学生の時代、柔術を習ったとき程じゃない。）たとえ、前受け身で落ちようと、自転車に絡まって首を折れることは十分可能だっただろう。自転車の上に宙返りが出来ても下手に首にでも背にでも落ちることも考えられないわけでもない。安全に地面に突いて簡単に終わったのは、それぞれに信じ方によれば、純幸運と言っても、神のみ腕と言って間違ってない。
そこから物事が複雑に運んだ。
There are many medicines that just don't work for me, or work too well and wrong.
僕の体に合わない薬あります。効かないか効きすぎるか変に効く。
I don't handle anesthesia well. Don't ask. I just don't.
麻酔は苦手どころではない。説明しにくいけど、結果がまずいのが多い。
It should be enough to say that I'd rather have a root canal worked on without pain-killers. Literally. Did that three years ago. Would have had to take a week off the job I had then if I'd let them use anesthesia, because I would not have been coherent enough to respond appropriately in class, much less plan lessons. It's that bad. That's part of the reason I've learned to handle pain without pain-killers.
まあ、歯根管治療は痛み止めなしで受けたいほどです。事実文字通りです。3年前に痛み止めなしで受けたのです。もし、痛み止めを使うことにしたとすると、仕事の1週間休暇を取って回復することになっただろうが、無しでやって休暇なしで済んだ。どうしてそれほどの休暇と言われると、たとえ授業に出れても、辻褄の合う応用が全くできない。授業の計画なんかとんでもない。痛み止めなしで痛みの対処ができるようにならないといけなかった理由です。
And I don't handle antibiotics well either. They do things to me that go way beyond funny. Make it hard for me to work. Solve one problem, make three more.
抗生剤も変に効く。結果が可笑しいという結果ところではない。作業が完全にできなくなってしまう。健康の一つの問題を解決するに三つの問題を作り出す。
The docs did not want me awake when they stabilized my elbow. Too much risk if I had spasms or something. No anesthetic, no operation. Likewise antibiotics. Insurance problems there if they didn't use them.
肘を安定させる手術の間、先生方は起きてほしくなかった。挽きつけなどの反応は危険すぎる。麻酔無しは手術も無い。抗生剤も同様。使用しないと保険の問題が出る。
So I begged them to give me the bare minimum, and to let me choose whether I needed them afterwards, unless I developed high fever or something. They were kind enough to let it go at that.
したがって、手術は最低限度の利用で、手術の後は、高熱を出すことなどがなければ、必要かどうかをぼくに任せてほしいと嘆願した。その要求を受け付けてくれたのです。
Here's the brace in the elbow, just after the operation. It's a faded print on paper, and I didn't get good focus when I took the picture of the print, so you can't see the breaks in the bone, only the shadows of the screws. I should get the electronic copies so you can see all the gravel between the screws.
手術直後の肘に入った補強材の写真です。紙に印刷したもので色が薄くなっているし、写真を取ったところはピントが合わなかったし、砂利状の割れ目が見えない。ネジの影だけが見える。電子型の映像をもらって投稿すればネジの間の小石のように崩れた骨が見えると思う。
Most of the screws, by the way, were not in there to hold the bracket in place so much as to be there for the bone to grow back around, and then hold things in place. At first, the bone wasn't solid enough for the screws to take hold of much. At least, that's what the docs said. Shattered.
そのネジの大半は因みに、L型金具を骨に止める訳ではなかったという説明だった。そうではなく、骨が骨を作り直してくれることに何かを囲んで新しい骨を作るようにしないとダメだった。新しい骨が出来てからは骨を止めることになる。先ずは、ネジが捕まえるほどの強さの骨がなかった。一応、それが先生方の説明だった。粉々になった、と。
[JMR: Translation to here, Jan. 31. ここまでの翻訳は1月31日。]
I had my arm in a plastic half-cast (custom 1/2 circumferential resin splint) all the time I was in the hospital, and I wasn't permitted to use the arm until the X-rays showed the bone successfully growing back together solidly enough.入院中は腕がずっとプラスティック製の半ギプス（カスタム合成樹脂製半周副木）に取り付けられ、その腕も、レントゲンによって十分くっ付いたとの判定が出るまで使用禁止だった。
Below is the brace they took out after six months, with the screws, cleaned up and packaged for me as a souvenir:
６ヶ月目で取り出してきれいに掃除してくれて、お土産としてくれた補強材とそのネジです。
I had them take it out as soon as possible because I was beginning to have reactions to the metal -- tight, sore muscles with cramps in my arm, neck, and back, and all the exercise I was doing wasn't loosening the shoulder up any further. (The metals don't help the immune systems, either, BTW.)
[Picking the translation back up on 6 October 2019:]
できるだけ早く抜いてもらおうと思った理由は、その金属に反応が出たのです。つまり、腕、首、背中などの筋肉が硬くなり、痛くなり、引きつったりし、あれほどの体操しても肩がもう、当時の程度以上緩むことが出来なくなったのです。そればかりか、その金属が免疫力に及ぼす影響が善くありません。
You wanted to see the hardware didn't you?
その補強材は見たいと思わなかった？
More than a year later, and the after-effects still make it hard to concentrate at work.
一年以上経ってもその副作用の影響があって、仕事に集中するのが難しくなることがよくあります。
Fortunately, the other guy's insurance paid 100% of the hospital, so I had a nice month to recover from the accident, the operation, and the medicine. And they covered getting the brace back out, too.
幸いに、入院費は相手様の保険会社が全額出してくれたお陰、一ヶ月ほどゆっくりして事故、手術及び薬からの回復するための時間が与えられました。肘の補強材を抜く手術も全額カバーしてくれた。
I went in for the removal on a Friday morning, out Monday afternoon, just long enough to be sure there wouldn't be any complications. And I taught lessons the evening after I got out. No big deal, other than the effects from the antibiotics. They let me do that one without painkillers. Not sure trying to avoid time off work was a good idea, though.
その抜く手術は金曜日の朝に入院、月曜日の昼から退院。
Maybe I can explain a little here about what the antibiotics do to me. I only had a part-time job teaching English, mostly to children, at a private juku, or tutor's school.
It was a new job, I had taken it because there was literally no place else that was looking like they would take me. It's not hard work, mostly just planning out simple activities where English is used, leading the students through them, and keeping an eye on them as you do so. For small classes, the planning is really something you can do on the spot, if you have experience and lots of tools handy.
When I was working in the public schools, I was handling classes of 30 or more students. At the juku, the classes were much smaller, from individual to six or seven students.
Both anti-biotics and anaesthesia make it hard for me to concentrate. They hamper my ability to think ahead, especially about things I can't see, and they make it hard for me to communicate verbally, especially when there are disagreements.
I couldn't handle making written plans, and I couldn't even really figure out why. And I couldn't handle discussing things with the other teachers.
They also suppress my immune systems, so I was spending a lot of time out of class in down time, recovering from sinus problems and other stuff.
One part-time job is not enough to pay the bills, so I picked up another translating. The translating job has worked out much better so far, mostly because my boss there has been very understanding. But that took pretty much all of the time I had outside of class, so there was no time at all to do planning. So I lost that job at the end of November, and am back to not having enough money to pay the bills, much less eat.
I have to admit, I had hoped the insurance would also pay enough to support me and my family for the time I couldn't really be working while I was recovering. That wasn't the case, and I haven't yet really recovered enough to hold a full-time job yet.
But, because I was in job-search mode at the time of the accident, they didn't want to give me any work compensation at all. No recognition of my efforts to write. The fact that I had to postpone a job interview because I was in the hospital, plus the fact that I had been working (and paying insurance) at the beginning of the year, did persuade them a little. They gave me enough to cover rent and part of the bills while I was in the hospital, and for another month after I got out, and then one more when I become incoherent on the phone trying to explain that it just wasn't enough.
(Incoherent. I tried to tell the agent he might as well be telling me to just crawl up somewhere and die. It might have come out like I was telling him he should die. Yeah, Japanese grammar is hard to handle, but this is also part of what the drugs do to me. No energy to know whether I have the grammar close enough to what I mean when I'm speaking Japanese.)
Ultimately, they gave me 160,000 yen a month for a total of three months. That's roughly USD 1,600 a month at exchange rates, and just barely enough to cover rent, utilities and maybe a half-month's groceries. And they deducted most of that preemptively from what they allocated to the final settlement -- you know, the one where they pay you for all the grief you suffered for it, after the fact. Except they don't, because there is no way to change things back, and because they have a bottom line they have to protect.
(That bottom line is the irony of insurance, by the way. Think about it. The guy that is supposed to be making sure you recover -- his real job is making sure you don't bankrupt the insurance company. That's the way insurance works.)
So I didn't really get enough protein, calcium, and proto-vitamin Bs in my diet while my body was rebuilding the joint.
So now I'm 15 degrees short of full extension in that elbow, with no expectation of improving. Sure, I can use the arm, but I can't get the full range.
That means I can't use full range when I'm exercising, so I can't afford to cut my exercises short. That makes it really hard to put together a forty-hour week, especially with more than an hour commute each way.
So why didn't I get at least a part-time temporary job as soon as I got out of the hospital? They said I could at least get work as a guardsman, swinging the red baton at construction sites, etc. The insurance company wants to know.
I did get back to the job search immediately -- before I was officially out of the hospital in fact. The hospital is conveniently close to the employment center, and when I was allowed to walk the two kilometer round trip, I went.
Some people thought standing out on the street eight hours a day with a traffic wand shouldn't be too hard, but I don't think they understand that, physically, it's just as demanding to stand in the middle of the street as in a store at a cash register. And the HR departments really don't want people who are still recovering from an accident. The guardsman needs to stay awake.
Some people thought I should be back in the classroom. I don't think they realize that there is competition for those jobs, and that they do actually take work, energy, and thinking.
It's also hard to describe how the medicine affects me. Sure, I was weak from the accident and the operation. And rebuilding takes energy.
But anesthesia and antibiotics just take it out of me, make it hard for me to think or move. Kill my immunities. And it doesn't just eventually go away. It was better during summer, but, winter, no, I'm still down as much as up. My sister brought me some stuff when they came to visit that seems to be helping me, but it's kind of rough on me, too. That's the way it is with these reactions.
It doesn't just go away after a day or a week or a month, and the person who needs the help is the one who gets blamed for not working hard enough, not trying hard enough.
The juku job required me to be close-quarters with children four or more hours a day. I like kids, I love to teach. But without physical defences I tend to catch whatever they have. I've had miserable sinuses all fall.
I have to have sleep. I cannot get by on less than five hours. Not if I've got to be productive enough to do a job. And the teaching job asked for "service overtime" -- reports and planning done off the clock, and only the most obvious (and least time-consuming) prep work would be paid for.
(The boss said, No! That's not service overtime! I'm supposed to have a habit of browsing through Pinterest, Instagram, Youtube, etc., two hours a day anyway, looking for stuff for kids to do, just because. Even though I have another job. And I should have the persistent store in my tablet necessary to hold all those apps and their caches and databases. Just Because. I note that it's a trend these days for employers to demand personal time be dedicated to the job. Just Because. Even though it sucks the creativity out of both the personal time and the job. Even though much of the value of the work is in what you bring in from completely outside the work context, rather than in what you pick up by staying effectively on-the-job unpaid too long.)
I still have to put in more than an hour of exercise for the elbow and the muscles in my arm and back, six days a week. I take a break from the exercises more than one day a week, and my back, shoulders, and sinuses get all tied up in knots. That makes it really hard to work a full-time schedule.
A year really hasn't been enough time to recover completely. What were they thinking when they claimed I should be recovered in three months -- because I wasn't working and making at least 6,000,000 yen a year at the time of the accident?
What, really, is insurance for?
Well, that's the short version of what happened. If you made it through this much bellyaching, well, thanks for your time. I hope it doesn't depress you.
(My former boss at the juku job told me I was being too negative about life. I think I'm being quite optimistic, all things considered. I'm not dead yet.)
[I took a copy of this just after I started translating, here: https://reiisi.blogspot.com/2018/12/pre-translation-what-happened-when-door.html.]
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment
Courtesy is courteous.